Following is a commentary -- not written by me -- which I thought some of   
   you might find interesting.   
      
   Religious freedom can't break law   
      
   Tom Krattenmaker - Pacific Daily News   
      
   March 31, 2011   
      
      
   Does the religious freedom of a small, separatist faith-healing church trump   
   the rights of its members' children to live to adulthood?   
      
   The Oregon Legislature is finally saying "no" after the headline-grabbing   
   deaths of three children whose parents belong to the Followers of Christ   
   Church in Oregon City. These were children with treatable illnesses:   
   pneumonia, a blood infection, kidney blockage. They received prayers,   
   anointing, the laying on of hands -- but no doctors or medicine.   
      
   Even in famously tolerant Oregon, the deaths have proved to be too much for   
   an alarmed public and its representatives. In a move that will align Oregon   
   law with most other states, legislators are pushing ahead with a bill that   
   would remove religious conviction as a defense against homicide charges   
   faced by parents who shun medical care for their kids, even at death's   
   doorstep.   
      
   With no organized opposition stepping forward, the bill's passage into law   
   seems inevitable. And pass it should. But before the episode fades out of   
   the spotlight, it's worth pausing for a moment to learn what we can from a   
   case that has something valuable to teach about religious rights and their   
   inevitable limits.   
      
   What the case demonstrates, in ultrabold print, is that no conversation   
   about religious rights is complete without equal attention to   
   responsibilities -- responsibilities to the community that all religious   
   practitioners bear, and that the Oregon City church has failed miserably to   
   uphold.   
      
   The moral of this story is one that runs all through American religious   
   history, manifest in such instances as the Mormon church having to give up   
   polygamy or fundamentalist Bob Jones University ending its ban on   
   interracial dating on pain of losing its tax exemption.   
      
   Religious freedom is not the only right at stake in the crowded public   
   square. And a religion cannot reasonably expect the public and the law to   
   respect its idiosyncratic ways when it fails to live up to the community's   
   well-considered standards -- such as the idea that children should receive   
   basic medical care when their lives are at stake.   
      
   Wherever questions of faith and health venture into the public realm,   
   advocates for the Christian Science church are sure to follow. Unlike the   
   reclusive Followers of Christ, the Boston-based Christian Scientists have   
   long striven to engage the public through their widely circulating   
   publications and the public reading rooms they operate in numerous cities.   
   For decades, the church has promoted the spiritual dimensions of health and   
   lobbied for legal space for their practices to go forward without undue   
   burdens.   
      
   But there's a reasonableness about the Christian Science approach that   
   stands in stark contrast to the Followers of Christ; doctors and medicine   
   are options when worse comes to worst.   
      
   From that proceeds the Christian Scientist position on the Oregon case --   
   one that has changed, tellingly, after the series of deaths among Followers   
   of Christ children since 2008. The Christian Scientists had gone to bat for   
   the Followers when they faced legislative threats in the past, but this time   
   they are standing down.   
      
   A broader problem with the national discourse over religion is the degree to   
   which rights have become an obsession, with far too little said about the   
   responsibilities that have to be an equal part of any serious conversation   
   about religion's place and prerogatives.   
      
   Responsibility is essentially what the Oregon Legislature is imposing on the   
   Followers of Christ. Whereas the Followers had previously enjoyed protection   
   from manslaughter prosecution in cases where children died for lack of   
   medical care, the new law means parents can no longer invoke religious   
   freedom in their defense. Attempts to heal children spiritually -- however   
   sincere the belief it will work -- will no longer be enough in the eyes of   
   the law.   
      
   Couldn't this be seen as an assault on the Followers' constitutionally   
   protected freedom of religion? A cursory glance might suggest "yes," but a   
   more complex view of the situation, and of long-standing Supreme Court   
   jurisprudence, leads to this realization: While freedom of religious belief   
   is absolute, the acting out of said freedom is not -- and, in truth, cannot   
   be if a pluralistic society is going to avoid chaos.   
      
   The legal distinction between religious belief and action dates to the   
   Mormon polygamy cases of the 19th century, explains Steven Green, a law   
   professor and director of Willamette University's Center for Religion, Law   
   and Democracy. If you've taken a religious history class, you might know the   
   story: The continued practice of polygamy -- then held by Mormons as crucial   
   to their eternal salvation -- stood at the center of a fierce conflict   
   between the Mormon church and U.S. government in the latter decades of the   
   1800s, effectively blocking Utah from statehood and forcing prominent   
   Mormons into hiding or prison. Via the Great Accommodation of 1890, the   
   church surrendered polygamy, paving the way to Utah statehood and the   
   broader acceptance of Mormonism into the mainstream of American life.   
      
   In an 1878 decision on the Mormons and polygamy, the Supreme Court held--   
   much like Oregon's Legislature today -- that religious freedom could not   
   justify (otherwise) criminal activity. If it could, the court reasoned, what   
   would stop a church from practicing human sacrifice?   
      
   Therein lies important practical wisdom that's worth remembering the next   
   time you hear people shouting indignantly about their rights with little   
   regard for the consequences faced by their fellow citizens of other   
   persuasions -- whether it's a pharmacy employee's "right" to refuse selling   
   legal contraceptives or an ardent secularist's "right" to be free of any   
   exposure to religious expression in public (as in the case of those who   
   would forbid mention of the G-word in the Pledge of Allegiance).   
      
   The freedom to believe as one chooses is crucial to the American way, and   
   belief has little meaning if it cannot be acted upon. Even so, as the   
   Followers of Christ are learning the hard way, the right to practice   
   religion must have its limits. Especially when the consequences are life or   
   death for those with no choice in the matter.   
      
      
   Tom Krattenmaker is a Portland-based writer specializing in religion in   
   public life and a member of USA TODAY's Board of Contributors. He is the   
   author of the award-winning book "Onward Christian Athletes."   
      
      
      
      
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